New Approach for the Evolution and Expansion of Space Debris Scenario

Ananthasayanam, MR and Anilkumar, AK and Subba Rao, PV (2006) New Approach for the Evolution and Expansion of Space Debris Scenario. In: Journal of Spacecraft and Rockets, 43 (6). pp. 1271-1282.

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Abstract

The evolution of the space debris scenario consisting of a very large number of fragments is described using the propagation of the characteristics of equivalent fragments without propagating each and every individual debris fragment. This is similar to characterizing a fluid in terms of the average density, pressure, and temperature without considering the velocities of individual molecules in a fluid element. The space debris fragments are assigned to a three-dimensional bin of semimajor axis, eccentricity, and ballistic coefficient. A suitably defined representative semimajor axis, eccentricity, and an equivalent ballistic coefficient (a, e, B) are defined for the equivalent fragments in each of the bins.Aconstant gain Kalman filtering technique based on 1) propagating the above characteristics, and 2) updating them as and when further measurements become available, has been proposed. Further the assimilation of the information from other breakups with the passage of time is also possible. The robustness of the constant Kalman gain approach instead of using the Kalman filter statistics helps to handle better the unmodeled or unmodelable errors due to the finite bin size and the environmental perturbations. This methodology is also suggested to handle massive atmospheric data assimilation problems.

Item Type:	Journal Article
Publication:	Journal of Spacecraft and Rockets
Publisher:	American Institute of Aeronautics and Astronautics (AIAA)
Additional Information:	Copyright of this article belongs to American Institute of Aeronautics and Astronautics (AIAA)
Department/Centre:	Division of Mechanical Sciences > Aerospace Engineering(Formerly Aeronautical Engineering)
Date Deposited:	08 Mar 2007
Last Modified:	19 Sep 2010 04:34
URI:	http://eprints.iisc.ac.in/id/eprint/9640

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